Only Ron Paul is not accepting general election donations!

[bmcosti]

Hillary, Obama, Edwards, Richardson, Kucinich, Dodd, Gravel, Biden, Romney, Guiliani, Thompson, McCain, Huckabee, Tancredo, Hunter are all accepting general election dollars. This means that they can accept up to $4,600 at a time from a donor.

Not Ron Paul. He is refusing general election donations at this time. He could have easily raked in millions more in money but he is waiting.

My speculation is he is holding out just in case his supporters insist he run as an independent or third party candidate in the unlikely occurance that he doesn't win the Republican nomination.

Why do you think he refuses these donations? I donated $3,300 and they returned $1,000 to me. Any official word from the campaign?

Have they changed thier policy over the last two months to start accepting general election donations?

Imagine how much he would raise tomorrow if he were to allow donations for the general election. An extra million or two?

[jumpyg1258]

Well it is not like they can spend that money they raise for the general election right now. It is basically a cheap way for those candidates to steal your money.

[slantedview]

because he's the only candidate with integrity.

[hellah10]

because he's the only candidate with integrity.

+1

[bmcosti]

because he's the only candidate with integrity.

Do you really think it is a integrity thing. It's very common for candidates at all levels especially for incumbents to collect the maximum amount of money possible as quickly as possible.

My point is if he starts growing a bigger fund to draw on he can point to the powers that be "See, I have the money to compete in the General Election, vote for me in the primary."

The other thought is that if he runs as a third party candidate, he raised that money as a Republican and opponents might use that against him.

[bmcosti]

bump

[bmcosti]

I am surprised at the results of the polls. Does anybody have any information on if Ron Paul will start accepting General Election donations. Tomorrow would be the perfect day to announce this. I really am feeling jealous that I can't be a part of it. I would love to see my name up on that banner.

[LibertyEagle]

I doubt he will start accepting them, until he feels fairly sure that he's going to win the Republican primary.

[sirachman]

No vote.

You dont get it, he is not taking general election donations because he wants all he can possibly get for the primaries now and he knows people only have so much money so any they give for the general now they wont give for the primaries now. also since u get it back if he doesnt win the primaries he also doesnt want people to be cheap and say hey i am only giving to general since i get it back if he doesnt win because they are a supporter yet cheap. instead he makes people think hey i cant give to general so my only chance is to give now, and people will probably give less since they are cheap but will have a larger amount for the big race later. this way they can give twice instead of once securely, but instead are in a way forced to either wait and give nothing now or give some now and hold off with some for the general. get my drift? im my opinion this is an AWESOME stradegy especially for a campaign like his based on ideas where lower income people are giving what they can when they can he can insure he gets all he can for the primaries knowing that whenever the general election comes and he gets the republican nomination he will have tons of donors throwing cash at him to keep the democrats like hillroy and obomba away.

[dirka]

blump

[bmcosti]

No vote.

You dont get it, he is not taking general election donations because he wants all he can possibly get for the primaries now and he knows people only have so much money so any they give for the general now they wont give for the primaries now. also since u get it back if he doesnt win the primaries he also doesnt want people to be cheap and say hey i am only giving to general since i get it back if he doesnt win because they are a supporter yet cheap. instead he makes people think hey i cant give to general so my only chance is to give now, and people will probably give less since they are cheap but will have a larger amount for the big race later. this way they can give twice instead of once securely, but instead are in a way forced to either wait and give nothing now or give some now and hold off with some for the general. get my drift? im my opinion this is an AWESOME stradegy especially for a campaign like his based on ideas where lower income people are giving what they can when they can he can insure he gets all he can for the primaries knowing that whenever the general election comes and he gets the republican nomination he will have tons of donors throwing cash at him to keep the democrats like hillroy and obomba away.

You make some good points. I would be interested to hear what Ron Paul would say on this.

[bmcosti]

No I meant that he would take general election donations for those who donated the maximum already. I think that only 3-5% of his donors have maxed out. But 3-5% of 130,000 donors is 3900 to 6500 people. If they all donated another $2300 that would be another 8-15 million dollars. Is my math off? That is a big number. Could there have been that many donors of that amount yet? That doesn't seem right.

[Proemio]

Why do you think he refuses these donations?

My guess? Because he doesn't need to.

Since money is somewhat unfortunately a major bragging rite, the vanilla candidates don't have much choice but to ask their limited number of moneyed supporters to max out on both seasons a.s.a.p., in order to show 'momentum' and hope for a band-wagon effect.

Ron Paul's growth potential is virtually unlimited as we can see - even on a slow Sunday like tomorrow...

[TheNewYorker]

It's because if he doesn't win the primary, he doesn't want everyone to have wasted their money on him for the general election that he can't even use. He's just that humble.

However, I feel the media could use this against him:

"Ron Paul, presidential longshot chooses not to accept general election donations because he knows he won't win the primaries."

[sirachman]

No I meant that he would take general election donations for those who donated the maximum already. I think that only 3-5% of his donors have maxed out. But 3-5% of 130,000 donors is 3900 to 6500 people. If they all donated another $2300 that would be another 8-15 million dollars. Is my math off? That is a big number. Could there have been that many donors of that amount yet? That doesn't seem right.

I understand what you mean, however the plan is to give no option until very close to the general election so that you have less people max out on only the general and not the primary which would do him no good. I don't think you can selectively allow donations from only those who have maxed out, but if you could and that got out that he was doing that it might not sound good. Either way he knows people that are going to max out on both or max out in the primary and donate in the general are doing to do so whenever he allows it. So to make things easier he will only open it up either really close to the republican party nomination or right at it. This lets him get money right up to the end and prevents anyone who wants to donate a bit of money from thinking "hey ill play it safe" and donating their only money to the general campaign coffer thus doing Ron Paul absolutely no good, thus giving them only one option up until he is very close to needing the money for the general he gets more donations to the coffer he can actually use. Plus with the way we do these tea partys he probably figures we can give him a couple massive ones around the time the primary results come out and then all the other republican neocons jump on our bus scared to death of hillary and obama.

[sirachman]

It's because if he doesn't win the primary, he doesn't want everyone to have wasted their money on him for the general election that he can't even use. He's just that humble.

However, I feel the media could use this against him:

"Ron Paul, presidential longshot chooses not to accept general election donations because he knows he won't win the primaries."

You get back your general election donations if the cantidate doesnt win the nomination and drops out. This is the reason that I think he is doing what I think he is doing. Just check my previous 2 threads.

[rory096]

He will start collecting these donations very soon!


Right around February 5 ;)

[bmcosti]

Just imagine if he sent out an email tomorrow saying that he will begin taking General Election donations. If 1,000 maxed out donors (out of about 4,000) ante up'd then that would be an additional 2.3 Mil!

[specsaregood]

Could it just be the fiscally responsible thing?
If he doesn't win the nomination, then they have to send the money back to the donors; this requires staff, time, paperwork and overhead costs. Why would he want to take the risk of having to spend money in the future, when he can simply wait until the chances of him not getting the nomination are slim.

[sirachman]

Just imagine if he sent out an email tomorrow saying that he will begin taking General Election donations. If 1,000 maxed out donors (out of about 4,000) ante up'd then that would be an additional 2.3 Mil!

He can only use for the general election so its pointless to get it early.

[bmcosti]

Just found out that Ron Paul accepts general election donations for his Congressional campaign.

The maximum an individual may contribute is $2,300 per election contest. Couples may contribute $4,600 per election contest. This means, for example, that contributions given for the Primary Election are counted as a different election contest than the General Election. So, if giving contibutions to both election contests, an individual may contribute a total of $4,600 and a couple $9,200.

But not his Presidential campaign.

Why?